


If You Forget Me

by voleuse



Category: Alias
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-04-07
Updated: 2004-04-07
Packaged: 2017-10-07 06:26:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/62321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voleuse/pseuds/voleuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>My love feeds on your love, beloved</em>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If You Forget Me

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers up to 3.17. Title, summary, and headings adapted from Pablo Neruda's _If You Forget Me_.

_i. I want you to know_

He proposes to her the morning after they make love for the sixth time.

She expects the proposal.

She didn't expect to cry.

_ii. everything carries me to you_

She falls in love with him four and a half months after their wedding.

It's not a bolt of lightning, and it's not a revelation by ecstasy.

They're taking a lunch break together, in the park, watching a pick-up basketball game. They share a couple of cartons of Szechuan, and she bites into a pepper accidentally.

She hasn't more than lifted her eyebrows in surprise before he's handing her a bottle of water, and preparing a spoonful of rice to cool the burn.

She grins around the mouthful of rice, and realizes as he laughs quietly, _I love this man_.

That night, watching the news, she holds his hand, and he smiles.

_iii. little by little you stop loving me_

It's a stupid, small, petty thing, she tells herself, that he forgot the anniversary of their first date. It's not something husbands would normally remember.

She tries not to think of the innumerable bouquets her mother has received over the years. First sight, first meeting, first date, first kiss, first proposal.

Then one night, she hears him crying in the bathroom. She doesn't ask him what's wrong; pretends to sleep through his tears.

The next morning, she peruses a few files, and knows that Sydney Bristow became a double-agent that day.

She tells herself she doesn't care.

_iv. suddenly you forget me_

She's on a plane to D.C. when Sydney Bristow reappears.

When she returns to Los Angeles, there's a message from Michael on their voicemail.

"I'm on a plane to Hong Kong," he explains. "I don't know when I'll be back."

She officially learns the truth at the morning briefing.

For that, she can't forgive him.

_v. leave me at the shore_

She kisses him when he tells her he is returning to the CIA, and tells him that she's happy for him.

His long afternoons become late nights, and the daily briefings become their quality time together.

It makes her work easier, sometimes, to be free of him, but she loathes their empty bed.

Every night he spends with Sydney Bristow is one spent away from her.

She doesn't sleep when he's on a mission.

She tells herself she has too much work to do, and if a few fallen tears stain the files, she'll be the only one to know why.

_vi. nothing is extinguished or forgotten_

The night after her father dies, Michael makes love to her, for the first time in weeks. He drags his lips over her shoulders, her throat, her breasts, and she doesn't bother to disguise her sobs.

Pain has been closely tied to pleasure, for her, and this reunion is exquisite agony.

Afterwards, he draws her into his arms, and she feels his tears dampen her hair.

"Why are you crying?" she asks.

He is quiet a moment. "For your father." He presses a kiss to her forehead. "For you."

She doesn't bother to acknowledge the lie.


End file.
